The Iowa Republican Party's presidential straw poll is Saturday, and even
though the poll is unofficial and non-binding, most Republican presidential
candidates have been working very hard to win it, or at least finish in the
top five. Candidates in both major parties have spent a huge proportion of their
time trying to woo Iowa voters. Former Tennessee Governor Lamar Alexander
claims 70 campaign trips to Iowa since the 1996 campaign. This focus on
Iowa has pushed the farm crisis to the top of the issues list for this
presidential campaign, but Iowans don't seem very impressed by the candidates'
promises to save the family farm.

Red, white, and blue and holding babies is still a good way to get votes at the Iowa State Fair. MPR's Martin Kaste presents a slide show during a day at the fair.

IOWANS HAVE COME TO EXPECT a certain degree of personal attention from
presidential candidates. This is especially true when it comes to the
candidates' positions on agriculture policy. Dave Kalsem, a farmer from
Cambridge, says he thinks he's settled on the candidate who he thinks would be
best for agriculture - though he's reluctant to say who.

Kalsem: I want to talk to him. If I can get to talk to him a little bit, see what
more he has to say about it.

Kalsem is probably justified in expecting a private one-on-one with his
candidate of choice, or at least one of the candidates. All the Republicans in
the race - except John McCain - have spent the summer traversing the state; trying
to collect supporters who'll vote in the August 14 Republican straw poll. The
Democrats, Vice-President Al Gore and former Senator Bill Bradley, have also had
last-minute swings through the state, to share some of the media attention being
generated by the Republican poll.

At a meet-and-greet on a local Democrat's front porch in Des Moines, Bill
Bradley talks about the importance of saving small farms.

Bradley: If you have an agri-business owning large farms, you have the beginning
of a vertically-integrated monopoly.

When Bradley represented New Jersey in the U.S. Senate, he opposed federal
subsidies for ethanol, a program many critics consider a subsidy for
corn-growers. Now that he's campaigning in Iowa, he's reversed himself,
pledging, in his words, "no raids on ethanol." He says the combination of bumper
crops with near-record low prices constitutes the "worst farm crisis in a
generation," and he lays much of the blame on the Republican-sponsored "Freedom
to Farm Act of 1996," which phased out federal subsidies and limits on
production.

Bradley: Freedom to Farm hasn't been successful. We need to think about new
products, we need to take land out of production, we need to have it so the public
will be able to buy that brand, "family farm" brand of pork, or whatever.

Still, neither he nor Vice President Al Gore are calling for a full-scale repeal
of "Freedom to Farm." Many farmers like the new ability to plant what they
want, when they want. Instead, the Democrats are offering changes in the
mechanics of how farmers sell their product, such as forcing grain companies and
meat packers to reveal how much they pay for crops in different parts of the
country.

"Porch Politics" dominates in Iowa. At a meet-and-greet on a local Democrat's front porch in Des Moines, Bill Bradley talks about the importance of saving small farms.
Photo: Martin Kaste

Most Republicans defend the Freedom to Farm Act, but they say the Clinton
Administration hasn't implemented it properly. Former Tennessee Governor Lamar
Alexander is the Republican who's spent the most time talking about the issues
with Iowa farmers, and his view parallels that of most of Republicans in the
race.

Alexander: Part of the promise of Freedom To Farm was to open markets, and we're not opening markets. This president is the first president since Nixon not to get the
Congress to give him the power to negotiate trade in fast track. He's not using
export credits, he's not retaliating against the Europeans. He's not living up
to his promise.

Other Republicans - primarily those who are running behind in the polls and in
fund-raising - see other factors at work in the farm crisis. Former Vice
President Dan Quayle says the Federal Reserve and rising interest rates are to
blame.

Quayle: I'm focusing on deflation. I'm trying to get Alan Greenspan out here to
recognize that we have deflation on the farm. We have Clinton/Gore/Greenspan
giving the farmer the cold shoulder.

Conservative TV commentator Pat Buchanan also blames the banking system, but
he takes it further; saying the administration and New York banks favor the
interests of foreign producers over American farmers.

Buchanan: We've shoveled out all this IMF (International Monetary Fund) money to these countries, and these
countries got to make money to pay back the New York banks, and the only way they can
make money is to dump goods in the United States. And so the American farmer and
worker and industry has been sacrificed on the altar of the global economy, which
has been structured for the benefit of Goldman Sachs.

Surprisingly, Buchanan - widely considered to occupy the right wing of
Republican ideology - is more willing than the Democrats to consider bringing
back some version of the old subsidies and price-guarantees structure. He
calls the "Freedom to Farm Act" an "experiment noble in purpose that has
failed."

Buchanan: You do want the American farmer basically to work in a free market,
but with a safety net under him for the vicissitudes of weather and conditions,
and global markets, and the rest. I mean, a farmer is someone who can make a
tremendous amount one year, and go deeply in debt the next year, through no
fault of his own.

Buchanan's views actually seem to resemble those of some left-leaning farm
activists, such as Iowa Farmers Union president John Whittaker.

Manning the Farmers Union booth in the Ag Building at the Iowa State Fair,
Whittaker says he wants the next president to promote a grain-reserve system
that would do more to prevent gluts in the market, and he wants the next Justice
Department to investigate the big commodities companies more aggressively for
possible price-fixing. Whittaker's a Democrat, and he thinks Al Gore is the
candidate most likely to deliver those changes. He says Gore told him as much
in a personal conversation just the other day. But Whittaker says he's also a
realist about what might happen to those promises.

Whittaker: After the caucus next winter, I hope they don't just leave us.
Evaporate like frost off a windshield, you know.
MPR: You're afraid they might?Whittaker: I've seen this happen in the past. Like I said, the vice president said
all the right things yesterday. We've got to get some action.